Hardware Acceleration of OpenAL and Vista SP1 XNA 3DAudio API

[R3MF]

I read this article on the future of Creative Labs/3DAudio Acceleration:
http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=3114

While I see lots of people cheering the demise of Creative (and i loath the company too), are people really willing to see the last proponent of Hardware Audio Acceleration disappear down the pan?

The amiga way of having dedicated hardware to massively speed-up discreet computing needs is always the best way of doing things, and we know it which is why we buy GPU's, PPU's and APU's.
Using the generic and unspectacular power of the x86 CPU to shoulder the burden of any of the above tasks is stupid. Period.

I know that Vista currently has no acceleratable (sp?) audio API, which is making Audio DSP cards like the X-Fi look redundant, but there are two advancements in 3D Game audio that did not appear to be covered in the article above before the authors leaps to his conclusion. They are:
1) OpenAL - many games now use this API and I believe that Creative do intend that the X-Fi be able to accelerate this in hardware.
2) Vista SP1 is supposed to bring the Xbox XNA (sp?) 3D audio API to the PC, why could not Creative do with this as they have done with Direct3D/Alchemy.

There seems to be plenty of future potential for hardware acceleration of 3D Audio in PC gaming, and it seems cretinous for PC gamers to accept that the best place to process the 3D audio is within the CPU.

The article concludes that the X-Fi will probably be the last generation of dedicated DSP audio chips for the purpose of 3DAudio Hardware Acceleration, but in ignoring the potential of OpenAL and XNA (sp?) I believe anandtech have done themselves a disservice.

What do you think; should the article be updated to make mention of this?

Regards

REMF



p.s. I personally loath and despise CL for the shoddy drivers, and i own no X-Fi cards in either of my systems, so i am definately no fan-boi!

 

[Modelworks]

Creative is not the last proponent of hardware audio acceleration.
There are plenty of other companies in the hardware audio market that produce chipsets equal to or better than creative and have better customer support.

The only thing creative has going for it is EAX , everything else is done by other companies and often better.

As for API , look at ASIO, its been around longer than openal , directx, etc.
Its faster and more stable and allows programs direct access to the hardware.

 

[manowar821]

I own an x-fi fatal1ty xtremegamer or whatever. It does a nice job in ASIO accelerated music creation, and also with Alchemy enhanced games.

I'm also betting on hardware acceleration coming back to Vista eventually. There are just too many negatives in going the course that they have been, IMO...

 

[R3MF]

Originally posted by: Modelworks
Creative is not the last proponent of hardware audio acceleration.
There are plenty of other companies in the hardware audio market that produce chipsets equal to or better than creative and have better customer support.

The only thing creative has going for it is EAX , everything else is done by other companies and often better.

As for API , look at ASIO, its been around longer than openal , directx, etc.
Its faster and more stable and allows programs direct access to the hardware.

i am not aware of any game oriented DSP heavy sound card that can rival the processing power of an X-Fi.....................................?

 

[R3MF]

Originally posted by: manowar821
I own an x-fi fatal1ty xtremegamer or whatever. It does a nice job in ASIO accelerated music creation, and also with Alchemy enhanced games.

I'm also betting on hardware acceleration coming back to Vista eventually. There are just too many negatives in going the course that they have been, IMO...

well, there is both XNA and OpenAL to start with............

 

[Ghouler]

Originally posted by: Modelworks
Creative is not the last proponent of hardware audio acceleration.
There are plenty of other companies in the hardware audio market that produce chipsets equal to or better than creative and have better customer support.
The only thing creative has going for it is EAX , everything else is done by other companies and often better.

There are several companies manufacturing sound cards but they are all using the same chipsets - it is either C-Media or Creative. Or realtek - for onboard audio.

If Creative goes down there is no competition whatsoever on the market anymore - everyone will get C-Media based card which is not necessarily a great perspective.

I like Creative sound cards and think there is more then EAX to them, although EAX HD is essential for gaming. Virtual surround over headphones system introduced by X-Fi sounds way better then Dolby system for headphones. Also: the sample rate conversion mechanism on X-Fi is excellent and with no audible artifacts which is great if you mix several sources recorded at different rates(still this can be turn off for bit perfect playback). I could go on but that is not the point... the point here was I believe hardware accelerate audio.

Removal of hardware path for audio under Vista is yet another reason Vista is bound to fail, unless there is SP that fixes this and other issues.

 

[her34]

Originally posted by: R3MF

The amiga way of having dedicated hardware to massively speed-up discreet computing needs is always the best way of doing things, and we know it which is why we buy GPU's, PPU's and APU's.
Using the generic and unspectacular power of the x86 CPU to shoulder the burden of any of the above tasks is stupid. Period.

do you use a REALmagic Hollywood to watch dvd movies?


john carmack felt cpu was good to handle audio needs of doom 3 until creative sued id into adding eax

Originally posted by: R3MF
There seems to be plenty of future potential for hardware acceleration of 3D Audio in PC gaming, and it seems cretinous for PC gamers to accept that the best place to process the 3D audio is within the CPU.

??? what potential?